Rain + Umbrella + Camera + Streets

For most photographers, rainy days are no-shoot-just-stay-at-home-and-browse-9gag-days. But for streetogs, rainy days are days-to-shoot-and-die-for. Or something close, like cotton-candy-on-sundays-under-the-golden-hours shizzle. 

Seriously, shooting the streets during rainy days are almost zen-like. Well, at least for me. The rain brings about both advantages and disadvantages to the streettog. Let me enumerate some, okay?

Advantages:

1. Invisibility. 

Most people are too busy/concentrated/irritated on their efforts to ward off the rain from their precious bodies that they don't really pay too much attention to strangers taking photos of them face-to-face. Really. I swear no one gives that much attention to me when I shoot in the rain. I feel most invisible during these days. *smug face*

©Julian Carlo Barbadillo

2. Characters. The rain seems to be nature's open invitation for unique characters to go out and roam the streets. You can encounter a variety of weird and funny-looking rainwear fashion, faces with stories that complement the rainy mood, etc.

©Julian Carlo Barbadillo

3. Mood. Rain and fog provides a full-landscape makeover which proves to be a temporary cure to overfamiliarity to a place. The mood that accompanies rainy days are so much fun to exploit and to play with  to create some pretty interesting photographs.

©Julian Carlo Barbadillo

Disadvantages:

1. Camera-Handling. Unless you have weather-sealed cameras, this won't prove to be too much of a problem. But for us low-enders, extra care must be given to prevent our cameras from being soaked and rendered useless. Well for me, an umbrella does the job. But it limits my handling. An umbrella on my left hand means that I can't use manual focusing, or I can't brace my camera well to prevent camera shake. I normally rely on autofocus in these situations. Pre-focusing just won't work for me in these handicapped times because subjects do tend to pop out in every proximity possible - without my left hand on the focus ring, missing money shots would really be a pain.

2. Camera-handling. I just have to make sure I made the point. :))

So yeaaa. Shooting in the rain is a must try, and must be a habit for streettogs. Promise! ;))

*Check out works of Danny Santos II, a Singapore-based Filipino street photographer. His Bad Weather Project won so much acclaim in the international Street Photography scene! I'm a fan of his. :D

8th of July Streetwalk

After two long weeks, I finally had time to shoot! Woke up early and finished my laundry before scouring the streets. But when I started my walk, that dreaded feeling of over-familiarity with places that I've always been covering started to manifest. Seriously, that's one of the direst enemies of streettogs. 


Over-familiarity with a place hinders the ability to perceive and recognize interesting patterns, scenarios, and moments that would rather be momentous for one who is not as familiar with the place. I wandered for almost an hour on my regular route and got nothing. Dang,  I just wet my armpits (I was even wearing grey! Talk about greyscaled armpits. Haha. Gross. Sorry). 


With no inspiring scenarios in sight, I decided to go and grab some breakfast at Jollibee first. There I tried to do the Zen meditation technique which Sir Luis Liwanag had taught me. The technique supposedly clears your messy brain (due to overthinking and what not) and lets your it work faster afterwards. Something like a Cache Clear in internet browsers. So yea. And not so surprisingly (as I have already tried that for so many times), I finally got rid of the over familiarity and got some pretty nice photographs. Yey! :))
But not for so long. I really felt the urge to get lost. I mean to wander off track, to places I have never been. So I decided to brave the city market's alleys and found rather nice scenarios. I even felt invisible as the vast number of people busy with their own businesses weren't paying attention to me. Hoho.


So the following are my picked photos from this photowalk. Hope you like them! :)

"Light the way!" [no offense meant. hihi]

Life Event: A humble recognition from the OES forum

It has been a very busy and tiring week! I'm just being sneaky enough to steal some time to write about some pretty awesome stuff that happened in the past few days.


So there is this facebook forum/group called On Every Street (OES), a street photography forum with members/street photographers all around the globe. And there is this contest held by the group called the "OES Hall of Fame". Every month, photo entries are submitted by uploading them to a container album and are deliberated upon by the administrators of the group (who are experienced international street photographers). The best for each month is granted a spot on the Hall of Fame itself.


I joined the June HoF contest. And luckily...

My entry for June's OES HoF contest. My personal favorite as well. 

Man, this is my first award/recognition in the field of Street Photography! I felt so humbled and overwhelmed when Marco told me the news. I dunno, after all the efforts on learning and practicing SP, things like this would really prove to be a pat on the back, a reward and an affirmation that I'm on the right track Baby I was born this way. Though I don't really see myself as an awesome street photographer still. I feel that awesomeness in SP can not be measured by a single photograph, but by a consistently high-quality-jaw-dropping-knee-melting body of work. And that's my goal. :)


So yes. Just wanted to share the news. Hihi. Thank you all! Thank you again, OES family! And most of all, a big thank you to the Almighty. :)

Rhythm

Lady Luck was on my side today! :) The sun was a'shining as I was a'striding downtown Baguio. And I even happened to chance upon scenes which carried a certain degree of rhythm amidst chaos. The following two  photos are what I'm referring about. 

Copyright: Julian Barbadillo

Copyright: Julian Barbadillo

I don't wanna talk more about the photos, I'll leave the appreciation and criticism to you guys. :D 

The Unending Battle Between B&W and Color

There goes another misconception that street photographs must be exclusively in Black&White.

I believe that this misconception is rooted to elements which were exposed [pun intended] to the very origins of Street Photography and Photography itself: the ever humble film and paper. I won't dive into SP history stuff, tho, I'm not really good at remembering dates and names really. There are tons of resources out there on the net that would tackle those accounts better than me. ;) Anywaaays, going back to the topic: At the time Henri Cartier-Bresson (HCB) and friends (otherwise called THE Magnum Founders) were scouring and photographing the streets and doing projects about the post-war Earth, technology was far from its peak and all they had were cameras and film rolls which could capture light intensities ONLY. 

In other words, color capture was impossible. 

In other other words: They had no other choice but to shoot in black and white. 

Thus, the world was seen in black and white those days. It just happened that HCB, who lived in a world where red was grey and blue was lighter grey, was later on renowned as the Godfather of SP; naturally then, his works (and of many others in his time) defied the years and has had the power to influence even the youngest generation of street photographers. A strong influence and symbol of standards seen in, guess what?, black and white.

Thus it has lead us to somehow (even subconsciously) think that street shots must be in black and white. Well I do think that HCB himself would disagree. If color film were already existent in their era, I bet my lowly camera that HCB and friends would have shot in color. Or atleast not exclusively in BNW. And we'd think differently about the issue if ever.

But then, it is indeed undeniable that B&W images have a certain "xfactor" that we could not resist. But color has its own lineup of advantages and "charms" as well. So I think it would be fair to discuss and dissect both the methods.

*Advantages of B&W: 

1. The removal of the color stimuli arouses the mind to search and appreciate geometry, patterns, textures, symmetry, and relationships of the elements in the frame.

2. A sense of "rawness" is induced by B&W images (well at least for me).

Tried to emphasize the textures by eliminating the colors of the photo. Copyright: Julian Barbadillo

*Charms of Color:

1. Moods are much easier portrayed with the help of colors and their associated psychological interpretations. For example, a photo tainted with the primary colors invoke a sense of joy and even intensity. A photo dominated by blues seem to convey a gloomy atmosphere. 

2. If used properly, color could invoke what I call "eyegasms". You know what I mean. :))

A captured soul. I can't just dump the colors out of this photo. Copyright: Julian Barbadillo

And then again another question is raised: When should I use B&W or color?

Being born in the digital age, I have been an exclusive digital shooter since I got interested in photography. It's a shame I haven't tried film yet. But I'm planning to do so soon. Anyways, being a digital shooter as I am, I have learned a simple rule of thumb concerning this somewhere in the vast web of info we call 'internet', too sad I can't remember where exactly. But I'll gladly share it to everyone nonetheless (well if you won't really find this corny or plain common knowledge. 'Cause I found this very influencial to my workflow).

"If color isn't adding interest to your photo, drop it."

Hence, I never shoot in monochrome (never a BNW jpg straight from the cam) and just convert the photos to BNW according to my desire. But, I normally end up with a greater count for black and white photos after post processing. I dunno, maybe I'm more of a BNW shooter. :))

ANYWAYS! This had been a looong post, so I'll just share some name of photographers whose works are worthy to review and are relevant to the post. You might as well see the issue in a much lighter way and even learn more from their photographs. ;)

*Some renowned BNW Streettogs:

Henri Cartier-Bresson

Bruce Gilden

Eugene Smith

Elliott Erwitt

*Some Color Shooting Streettogs:

Alex Webb 

Martin Parr

Mikhael Subotzky

Mark Power

Fathers' Day '12 Streetwalk

I thought I'd go out and shoot exclusive Fathers' day-themed street shots today but later shrugged the idea off, thinking that shooting fathers on their very own special day is too mainstream. Haha. JK. I still had one decent shot which might fall under the theme. I find it quite sad, though.

This photo goes out to all the dads out there whose children has gone ahead of them in heaven.

I dropped by a Jollibee branch to grab some breakfast and saw the guy on the right as I was looking for a seat. He seemed to be sad and tulala (lost in thought). I decided to sit a few tables away from him thinking that a good scene might reveal in front of me with him as a subject. And I was quite right. After some minutes while I'm in the middle of my meal, a mother and her son occupied the table in front of him. The mom left her child for a moment to get some utensils, I think. And that was when I got to take the shot above. The guy staring at the boy with pure sadness in his eyes. Makes me wonder where his children are, and why he's all alone. Dang, it must be heartbreaking for him if what goes on my imagination is true.

So yea. Moving on! after my meal, i continued to stroll downtown for around 2 hours. And, luckily, I got some pretty nice photographs. I dunno, but I was amped up today. Maybe because I've been waiting for so long to shoot again (school deprives me of shoot-time. ugh) and I only got the chance today. Yea. The following are those "pretty-nice-photographs" for me. ;)

Curiosity is what drove me to shoot this photo. Questions ran in my mind as I saw this cat. Where's his owner? Pano kung jejebs o iihi ung pusa? Bakit pa sya sinama ng amo nia? haha. I'm not really accustomed to shooting scenes without people on them, but I personally think that this may pass as a street photo in the absence of the literal human element. 

Manong was quite a character. He's a street vendor with the swag (if that would make sense). The graffiti on the wall of his stall complements his character very well. (I'm not implying anything about 'weed' ,though. hehe)

Just a bunch of tourists. Quite interesting to see quirky patterns in mundane scenes, isn't it? :D

Saw this very colorful backdrop and instantly got the idea to wait for a character which would stand out against the vivid colors. And he is what I got, a monochrome-dressed man. Good enough! :D